Redwood forest

World’s tallest living tree—monarch of the North Coast—living link to the Age of Dinosaurs. Redwoods grow from seeds the size of a tomato seed yet can weigh 500 tons and stand taller than the statue of Liberty. Its foot-thick bark makes the tree all but impervious to fire and insects. Archibald Menzies first noted the coast redwood for western science in 1794. Its scientific name, Sequoia sempervirens (ever living), probably honors Cherokee leader Sequoyah. In 1918 paleontologists wanting to save this living link to our evolutionary past campaigned nationally to protect the trees. Three California redwoods state parks resulted: Prairie Creek (1923), Del Norte (1925), and Jedediah Smith (1929). To preserve the trees’ natural Coast Range setting and associated plants and animals, Redwood National Park was created in 1968 and expanded in 1978. The national park boundary encircled the three state parks to better protect superlative ancient redwood forests. In 1994 the National Park Service and California Department of Parks and Recreation began managing the parklands cooperatively, aiming to manage the parks the same. That’s why you see rangers in Redwood National Park Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park California state and national park uniforms anywhere in the parks, working for the same mission. The Parks’ designation as a World Heritage Site and part of the California Coast Rangers Biosphere Reserve reflects their worldwide recognition as irreplaceable treasures. Here, the diversity of life is protected for you and National Park Service U.S. Department of Parks and Recreation State of California for future generations. Help us safeguard this special place by treating it with care and respect.

From Exploration to Preservation

In 1800 redwood forests probably covered two million acres. As mid-1800s gold fever subsided here, redwood fever replaced it, Seeming endless at first, the trees soon fell to determined logging. The State of California preserved some key groves in the 1920s. Congress created Redwood National Park in 1968 to protect the world’s tallest trees and Redwood Creek’s salmon fishery.

The 1978 park expansion provided a buffer Zone between the park and logging upstream on private lands and a watershed restoration program to remove logging roads and rehabilitate thousands of acres of cut-over land. Redwood National and State Parks protect nearly 40,000 acres of ancient forest, almost half of all than remain.

Jedediah Strong Smith Lacking good deep harbors, the redwood coast drew little attention until fur trapper Jed Smith arrived overland in 1828. Smith sought a better route between the Rockies and Pacific. Gold miners opened this area to settlement in the 1850s.

Moving logs with steam power ushered in the industrial logging era.

Gold mining began after 1848 strikes on the Trinity River.

Mining and Logging California’s northern coast was largely ignored by non-Indians until gold was discovered on Gold Bluffs Beach in 1850. Mining profits were marginal. Revived during the Civil War, the mines closed at the war’s end. Various methods were tried later, but operations ceased by 1920. A few remains of mining operations still exits on Gold Bluffs Beach.

Logging began in redwood country in 1851, At first small logs were floated to small mills or dragged by oxen on skid roads were used in the 1870s, then the steam donkey in 1882 and bull donkey (above left) 10 Year later. Bulldozers were used by the 1920s, trucks by the 1940s. Redwood lumber built some of San Francisco’s great Victorian homes.

The Coast Redwood

Coast redwoods tower over all other trees over 370 feet tall have been recorded across the region. Redwood forests develop the world’s greatest reported volume of living matter per unit of land surface. Giant sequoias grow to larger diameters and bulk but do not grow as tall. Coast redwoods can live to about 2,000 years old; they average 500 to 700 years old. They have no known killing diseases and do not suffer significant insect damage.

Merely to stand in a redwood grove inspires many visitors to champion these trees’ preservation.

Coast redwoods grow in a narrow strip along the Pacific Coast of California and southwestern Oregon. Giant sequoias grow only on the Sierra Nevada’s western slope.

Coast Redwood Facts

Height: To nearly 380 ft.

Age: To 2,000 years

Bark: To 12 in. thick

Base: To 22 ft. diam.

Reproduce: By seed or sprout

Seed size: Like a tomato seed

Cone size: Like a large olive

Giant Sequoia Facts

Height: To 311 ft.

Age: To 3,200 years

Bark: To 31 in. thick

Base: To 40 ft. diameter.

Reproduce: By seed only

Seed size: Like an oat Flake

Cone size: Like a Chicken egg

From Seed and Sprout

Redwood-like trees grew over much of the Northern Hemisphere in the Age of Dinosaurs. Later climate change reduced redwood habitat to this narrow, fog-bound coastal corridor. (See “The Role of Fog” at lower right.)

Coast redwoods reproduce by seed and by stump and basal sprouting. Seeds slightly bigger than a pinhead are released from mature cones that ripen in August and September. If a redwood is felled or is badly burned, a ring of new trees often sprouts from burls around the trunk’s base. These so-called “family groups” are common. Saplings use the parent tree’s root system.

Redwoods have no taproot; their roots penetrate only 10 to 13 feet deep but spread out 60 to 80 feet.

Treasures of Nature and Culture

From sea level to 3,200 feet in elevation in the Coast Range, a mild, moist climate assures the parks an abundant diversity of wildlife. Elusive to visitors, many mammals, birds, amphibians, and insects live in the mature redwood forest. They depend on it for food and for shelter. Prairies form natural islands of grasslands, where wildlife abounds.

Roosevelt elk favor prairie and other open lands but seek forests for cover and shade. The parks’ largest land mammals, elk may exceed 1,000 pounds.

Much bigger antlers distinguish them from black-tailed deer. Good places to see Roosevelt elk are Elk Prairie campground and Gold Bluffs Beach. Look for them along the Bald Hills and Davison roads, too Be alert for elk Crossing highways.

Park streams offer swimming and floating. Steel head, cutthroat trout (the speckled fish pictured center below), and Chinook salmon (center below) inhabit these streams.

Prairies and Waterways

Prairies and rivers reflect the changing of seasons far better than redwood groves do.

In springtime, prairie wildflowers burst with color that gives way in the dry summer to the grassland’s amber glow. Prairies are the realm of raptors, the predatory red-tailed hawk, kestrel, and great horned owl, and their prey of gophers and meadow mice.

Mountain lions, bobcats, coyotes, foxes, elk, and black-tailed deer frequent prairies kept free of trees by prescribed fire and grazing elk.

Acorn-bearing Oregon white oaks edge prairies at the higher elevations. Oaks provided protein rich food for Indians, who cleared the understory with fire. Prairies make good birding spots. There you may see the goldfinch, junco, quail, or raven.

The parks’ rivers are world-renowned for fishing and loved for recreation and their sheer beauty. The Smith River, named for Jedediah Smith, arises in the Siskiyou Mountains and then flows through the parks’ northern section. It is now California’s last major free-flowing river and is famous for salmon and steelhead.

The Klamath River, also a salmon and steelhead stream, crosses the mid-section of the parks,

Redwood Creek flows through the parks’ southern part. Salmon and steelhead populations were severely diminished by past logging in the Redwood Creek watershed.

Black Bears

Seldom seen, black bears roam these parks. Most haven’t lost their fear of humans. Fond of acorns, bears travel far to harvest them. To prevent wild bears from becoming problem bears We must keep human food away from them. Use sound food storage practices. Counter-balance all food, scented items—soap, toothpaste, lotion—and garbage in a tree 200 feet from camp; 12 feet up and 10 feet out from the trunk; and five feet down from the branch. Ask a park ranger about how to store your food.

Remember: a bear seeking food from human camps can be aggressive and may have to be destroyed. Please keep wildlife wild.

Watershed Protection

Congress expanded the national park in 1978 and directed the National Park Service to rehabilitate logged-over lands. Bulldozers recon toured hillsides and stream channels to restore conditions that favor return of natural vegetation. Congress also created a 30,000-acre protection zone upstream from the park in Redwood creek’s watershed. This limits effects of the timber harvesting there on the park down-stream.

Listen to the excavator’s rumble and the bulldozer’s roar. The same equipment that was used to build the logging roads (above) now takes the roads out! Be sure to visit one the rehabilitated sites during your stay in the parks.

Indians of the Redwood Coast

American Indians have lived along the redwood coast for thousands of years. Belonging to several different languages, despite living in a relatively small area. Before non-Indian people arrived in the 1850s, Indian villages, with their split-plank structures (above top), dotted the coast and lined major rivers.

Travel was by redwood dugout canoes (above) on waterways and by foot on an elaborate trail system. Foods varied with the seasons. They fished ocean and rivers, hunted land and marine mammals, and gathered nuts, seeds, and berries. American Indians today live on and off reservation lands and represent five to 10 percent of the local population. Groups are represented by sovereign governments and many traditions continue.

Some members still speak the languages. Traditional ceremonies are held, hunting and fishing are still important, and the traditional arts and crafts are kept alive.

Redwood National and State Parks lie in traditional territories of three Indian groups. Yurok and Tolowa groups still exist; the Chilula have assimilated into the inland Hupa culture.

Life Along the Seacoast

Even apart from the Coast Range and its lofty forests, the coastline here would justify national or state park status. Rugged and largely unaltered by humans, the coastline features stretches of steep and rocky, its tidal zone can be tough to traverse. Gold Bluffs Beach is an exception, with its seven-mile stretch of dunes and sandy beach. On the coastline you may discover a rich mix of forms of life that live in the distinct habitats illustrated below.

Many of the parks’ animal species thrive along the coast. Brown pelicans are summer visitor. Cormorants take to lagoon or river and shore waters. Wallets and sanderlings work the beach. Offshore may be Pacific gray whales in migration, seals, sea lions, dolphins, porpoises, and orca whales. In the intertidal areas the cycle of rising and falling tides has produced tightly zoned layers of life. To help protect these animals, the national park boundary extends one quarter mile offshore.

Offshore

Between shore and the deep ocean here an averages surface acre is as productive as an acre of fertilized agricultural land. The basic wealth lies in phytoplankton, single-celled plants.

Sea lions feed beyond the surf and haul out on shore or on sea stacks. Harbor seals swim in the surf and haul out in sheltered coves. Sea birds nest offshore on rocks.

The California Current flows south. It works with offshore winds to draw nutrients up from deep waters, providing food for many coastal creatures. Moisture-laden air off the California Current condenses as low clouds over cold water near shore.

Intertidal zone

Tides rise and fall twice daily on a 25-hour lunar cycle. In the zone between high and low tide, life forms arrange themselves vertically based on tolerance for exposure to air and/or water and to heat and wave shock. Other biological limits are predators and competition for food and space

A splash zone above high tide is home for periwinkle snails and beach hoppers that can withstand episodic wetting and wave shock. Splash zone species are transitional but more attuned to life on land than in the sea. Mussels cling to rocks in the high-tide zone, covered by water only at high tide. Shells let them tolerate temporary exposure to air and direct sunlight.

Seaweeds provide oxygen, food, and shelter for intertidal zone residents. Some kelp, anchored in deep water, with built-in floats, are tall as redwood trees.

Tide pools shelter life in rocky beach outcroppings. Tide pool dwellers cope with great changes in water temperature, salinity, and oxygen content. Here are barnacles, limpets, nudibranchs, ochre sea stars, sea urchins, and erect sea palms anchored by root like hold-fasts.

Sea Cliffs

Northern park beaches tend to be rocky and backed by sea cliffs. Southern beaches tend to be backed by bluffs. Over half of the parks’ birds are marine species. Some nest—often as crowds—in sea cliffs: murres, cormorants, puffins, auklets, gulls, and pigeon guillemots.

The Role of fog

As air warmed by inland heat passes over the cold, near-shore waters, fog forms—in summer almost daily. Fog helps to approximate the mid, moist climate that prevailed during the Age of Dinosaurs, when redwood like species grew over much of North America.

Fog brings the redwood forests relief from the dry summer, too. It reduces the loss of water through leaf surfaces. Fog collects on trees and then its precious moisture droops to the forest floor. Fog is not essential to redwoods, but its absence would reduce their range.

Woodlands

The Coast Ranger’s west slope forests benefit from being close to the ocean—for fog, rainfall, and moderated climate. Redwoods favor the moist, north-facing slopes where sunlight’s effects are less drying. Rivers near sea level also provide hospitable flats for these big trees.

Redwood National Park is one of over 400 parks in the National Park System.to learn more about national parks and National Park Service programs in America’s communities, visit www.nps.gov